Imran moves IHC for lawyer acess in £190m case

Application alleges over three months of denied legal access, accuses NAB of deliberate delay in proceedings

ISLAMABAD:

A miscellaneous application has been filed in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder and former premier Imran Khan on Saturday, requesting permission to meet with his lawyers for legal consultation regarding the appeal against his sentence in the £190 million case.

The application, filed through Barrister Salman Safdar, seeks the provision of an immediate and uninterrupted meeting between Imran and his legal counsel. The chairman of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), the inspector general of Punjab Prisons, and the superintendent of Adiala Jail have been made respondents in the application.

According to the text of the application, Imran has not been able to have any meaningful meeting with his counsel since December 20, 2025 – a period of approximately three months and 12 days during which he has been deprived of legal access.

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The application further states that the suspension of sentence application, which has been pending since March 19, 2025, has seen hearings on 16 different dates so far. It alleges that NAB's conduct is deliberately causing delay and obstruction in the proceedings of the case, and that all efforts by lawyers to meet with their client have been thwarted by jail authorities.

The application invokes Jail Rules, 1978, and Articles 9, 10-A, and 14 of the Constitution of Pakistan, arguing that the right to meet a lawyer constitutes a fundamental right. "The act of banning inmates from meeting their families, friends, and legal counsel is not only in blatant violation of the Pakistan Prison Rules, 1978, but also amounts to a gross abuse of fundamental human rights," the application reads.

It submits further that the right of access to counsel is an established legal and constitutional safeguard...and is equally available to prisoners facing the gravest of charges, including capital offences".

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The application has called upon the court to issue an immediate order allowing both Imran and his wife, Bushra Bibi, to meet their counsel "for the purpose of legal consultation and effective preparation of the pending Appeal, to safeguard their fundamental and constitutional rights."

Yesterday, lawyers for Bushra Bibi moved the IHC seeking a ruling for the suspension of her sentence in the £190 million case before her appeal against her conviction was taken up.

The application, also filed by Safdar, contends that bail-related matters must be prioritised in line with Supreme Court directives, adding that delay in hearing suspension petitions would run contrary to the apex court's established policy.

In January last year, an Islamabad accountability court sentenced Imran to 14 years and Bibi to seven years in prison in the £190 million case, filed by NAB. Currently, the IHC is hearing appeals for suspending these sentences.